Taking Flak for Pricey Crops, Biofuel Industry Fires Back

By Stephen Pounds, The Palm Beach Post, Fla.

May 10–After years of glowing stories about the biofuels movement, it must have felt like a slap in the face to industry representatives to see negative coverage starting last year about the increasing cost of food.

Newspapers and radio stations around the country have documented the rise in food prices tied to the growing price of corn and other crops used to make biofuels.

At the Biotechnology Industry Organization International Convention this week in Boston, the injured movement shot back with reports and commentary defending biofuel and its many virtues.

“There’s been a lot of debate over the use of feedstock for fuel, and we think it’s been overblown,” said Brent Erickson, the organization’s executive vice president.

The industry acknowledges that prices have risen. The starkest example is the price of corn, which has almost doubled in the past 15 months from $1.98 a bushel to $3.76 a bushel.

Prices of meat products such as steak, ground beef, chicken and bacon also have risen, but by only a few cents. Cattle, chickens and pigs compete with biofuels for their feed.

“Most of the corn that’s in the grocery aisle is in the meat section,” joked Richard Hamilton, chief executive of Ceres Inc., a Los Angeles-based firm developing so-called energy crops.

Processed-food favorites such as cola and beer also edged upward, according to the National Corn Growers Association. But the fear is that food in undeveloped countries will become more expensive as they embrace biofuels.

States that are major producers of ethanol, one form of biofuel, said the spike in food prices is just a blip created by the high price of a barrel of oil. Oil prices make ethanol look more attractive to grain farmers.

“Farmers watch the market more than anything, and they go where the prices go,” said Kelly Gillespie, director of Missouri’s biotech association.

But other factors also are worth noting, Gillespie argued, such as the idea that biofuels can reduce U.S. energy dependence on the Middle East.

There are no biofuel plants in Florida, but four are on the drawing board. The state also has awarded $15 million in grants to companies involved in renewable-energy projects.

This is the other favorite argument of proponents such as Bill Northey, Iowa secretary of agriculture; and Jim Breson, BP energy biosciences project manager: As the United States moves from a hydrocarbon economy to a carbohydrate economy, cellulosic biomass — the stuff of weeds, plant waste and wood — will replace corn as a fuel ingredient. The question is when.

“We believe significant advances will occur in the next three years,” Breson said. “With the introduction of cellulosic materials, we believe there will be enough feedstock for food.” Research is under way to produce enzymes to break down cellulosic materials more quickly. Biofuel proponents also predict that biotech advances will improve crop yield and the fermentation process that leads to fuel production.

And if it doesn’t, the industry will just wait out the flak, Northey said.

“There’s been criticism in the past, and the food-for-fuel debate is no different,” he said. “We’ll survive.”

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